Rangers Annual Results: Club announce huge loss of £14.3m

Rangers have announced a huge loss of £14.3 million in their latest annual accounts, despite increases in both turnover and season ticket sales.

But Dave King, the Rangers chairman, has insisted it was a year which saw the Ibrox club ‘normalise’ their financial affairs.

The figures for the 12 months to 30 June 2018 include expenditure for the refurbishment of Ibrox Stadium and the club’s training ground, as well as the costly failure of Pedro Caixinha’s managerial tenure which was terminated a year ago.

Rangers’ loss is more than double the £6.7 million they posted for the previous year, while operating expenses increased by almost £8 million to £38.9 million. Turnover increased by more than £3 million to £32.6 million.

Rangers chairman Dave King. Picture: SNS

“On balance, the year to June 30, 2018, was a positive one despite the need for further change to ensure the progression that this club requires both on and off the pitch,” said King in a statement.

“Figures can be reviewed in various ways but the underlying and strong message is that Rangers, as a football club and business, continues to move forward. It will always be a challenge to meet the demands and expectations of a wonderful support and that is why we continue to invest massively in our infrastructure, team and staff.

“It was inevitable, given our dire starting position that vast amounts of money would have to be spent on rebuilding our facilities and the various departments within them. These costs are reflected in the figures but it is important to highlight that the last financial year saw us normalise our financial affairs to the extent we no longer face questions about our financial strength when dealing with suppliers, other clubs and financial institutions.

“This is an extremely positive change over such a short period and I cannot thank my fellow Directors and other investors enough for their continued support which helps drive our club forward. Again we have had to reassess our team management structure and this of course means a further spend, from which we did not shrink and neither will we neglect the infrastructure, which accounts for a huge amount of our spending even if this work goes largely unseen.

“Witnessing the selfless extent to which my colleagues are willing to invest has been truly humbling and the structure of the loans advanced means they can be converted to equity when future share issues are undertaken. So, when analysing the financial statements under review these loans can be viewed as equity and not third-party debt.”

Rangers’ annual general meeting will be held in Glasgow on 27 November.